Stafford scandal: Jeremy Hunt calls for police inquiry into NHS

Police should investigate the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of patients at
the Mid Staffordshire NHS hospitals in the wake of the public inquiry, the
Health Secretary says.

Mr Hunt says the Francis report into the scandal has put “evidence in the public domain” which should form the basis of a police investigation.Photo: Heathcliff O'Malley

By Robert Winnett and Benedict Brogan

10:00PM GMT 08 Feb 2013

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Jeremy Hunt says it is “absolutely disgraceful” that no doctors, nurses or managers have been held to account for the substandard care which led to the deaths of up to 1,200 patients.

He says the Francis report into the scandal has put “evidence in the public domain” which should form the basis of a police investigation and questions the failure of professional bodies to uncover “abuse on such a wide scale”.

The Health Secretary also says there needs to be a major change in culture across the NHS as compassion was being “crushed” out of doctors and nurses by the system.

He admits he is not sure which hospitals are doing a good job and indicates that league tables of health services – similar to those for schools – may be necessary to quickly identify poor care. In today’s interview, the first since the public inquiry, Mr Hunt says: “I think it’s absolutely outrageous that potentially more than a thousand people lost their lives because of poor care and not a single person has been brought to book.

“This was a public inquiry that was designed to help us understand why the system didn’t pick up what went wrong but I think it is absolutely disgraceful with all those things happening, whether it is doctors, nurses or managers, nobody has been held to account.”

Asked whether the information should now be passed to the police, he replied: “Well, that evidence is in the public domain. And you know, it’s there for the police – and it’s there for the professional bodies, the GMC [General Medical Council] and the NMC [Nursing and Midwifery Council] to look at – and they should do that.”

He also said: “As a politician, I am not in a position to say this nurse is guilty, this nurse is not, and all these things have to be decided at arms length following due process.

“This is about people’s careers and livelihood and there has to be fairness of course.”

Mr Hunt expressed frustration over the failure of professional bodies, who are responsible for regulating medical staff, to uncover the poor standards of care. “It should be a real cause for reflection for the professional bodies in this case, that you could have abuse on such a wide scale with so many warning signals and yet in the end, none of the disciplinary procedures seem to have worked.”

Earlier this week, Robert Francis QC, published his report into the failings at Stafford Hospital, where up to 1,200 people died as a result of poor care between 2005 and 2008.

Mr Francis said that the scandal raised serious questions about the culture of the entire NHS and made more than 200 separate recommendations.

Ten nurses from Mid Staffordshire are currently awaiting disciplinary hearings, nine of whom are still working in the NHS.

In the wake of the Francis Report, Sir Bruce Keogh, the medical director of the NHS, announced that he would begin urgent investigations into a further five hospital trusts where death rates are far higher than would be expected.

In today’s interview, Mr Hunt refuses to say whether he would be happy for his family to be treated in these hospitals. However, he insists he is determined to tackle a culture that had developed in the NHS.

“We have a culture in too many parts of the NHS that instead of bringing out the best in people, brings out the worst,” he says. “People join the NHS because they have innate decency, compassion and caring values that makes them give their life towards helping people get better when they’re at their most vulnerable – but we have a system that all too often crushes that…”

He added: “The big cultural change that we need to make in the NHS is that looking after people with care and compassion needs to be part of the definition of success for every manager, every doctor and every nurse.

“The definition of success for hospitals in the NHS to date has been meeting ministerial targets, getting foundation status, getting a new hospital built on time – and not what the public think hospitals are there for, which is looking after people with decency, care, dignity and respect.”

The Health Secretary admitted that “politicians on all sides have not been brave enough to speak out in the face of failure” and that the “deification” of the NHS may have led to problems not being addressed.

Mr Hunt admits that turning the NHS into a service that providesg hospitals with some of the best survival rates in the world will take “five or eight years”.